what golden crosses and dead crosses are
They’re cool-sounding names.
They should probably have their own tee-shirts.
But…
…what they are is technical indicators.
They’re descriptions of behavior of short-term vs. long-term moving averages.
In both cases, two moving averages, one short-term, one long-term, for the same index or security are being charted on the same graph–usually values on the vertical scale, time on the horizontal.
A golden cross occurs when the short-term moving average, which has been below the long-term moving average on the chart, crosses and moves above the long-term average. The claim is that this signals a significant upturn.
A dead cross (or death cross) occurs when the short-term moving average has been trading above the long-term average but crosses and breaks down below the long-term average. This supposedly signals a significant downturn.
They’re called crosses because in both cases the two lines cross one another.
different moving averages for different indices, different markets
The short-term and long-term moving averages used to determine the crosses differ both by country and with the index being analyzed. In the case of the S&P 500, for example, technical analysts typically use 50-day and 200-day moving averages.
If the 50-day moving average for the S&P is below the 200-day, this means that more price action over the past 2 1/2 months (assuming 20 trading days per month) has been weaker than the average over the past ten-month period. If the 50-day moving average subsequently turns up sharply enough to break through the 200-day line, proponents of the indicator believe the weakness has ended and a significant rally has started.
In similar fashion, if the 50-day moving average dives below the 200-day, then a period of strength has come to an end and significant weakness lies ahead.
my thoughts
I’m not a fan.
I first encountered people actually using the two crosses in Tokyo and Hong Kong. That was mostly, In think, because they had nothing better. They didn’t have professional securities analysts forecasting earnings; they didn’t apply any macroeconomic data to help figure out the general market direction, either. So they were left with either the entrails of chickens, which would have been pretty messy, or stuff like the cross twins.
important in Asia
The crosses did then, and still do, have a significant effect in Asian markets because people use them–not that they have any particularly important objective significance..
making a comeback in the US
In the US, technical analysis, including the idea of the two types of crosses, seems to me to be making a comeback after over a half-century of neglect. How so?
–I think some hedge fund managers who cut their teeth trading commodities are trying to use the same technical tools on stocks
–brokers fired most of their experienced analysts during the Great Recession, so there isn’t as much easily available, reliable fundamental information around as before
–discount brokers can supply technical indicators to their active retail traders at low cost. They’re cheap; they require little effort to learn; it seems to make the customers feel good to spout obscure jargon (who doesn’t like showing off this way?); and, since the clients “read” the charts themselves, brokers don’t incur the legal liability they would if they were supplying actual stock analysis.
Why write about this now? The Dow made a golden cross a few weeks ago and short-term traders have been making a fuss since.